The document covers the 48km segment between Palmdale and Burbank in Southern California. It will be presented to the authority’s board of directors at the end of the month.
The section features about 48km of tunnelling, including 45km through mountains. It will connect the Antelope Valley to the San Fernando Valley in a roughly 17-minute train trip – more than twice as fast as traveling by road. The Palmdale to Burbank Project Section will connect two key population centres in Los Angeles County by linking future multimodal transport hubs in Palmdale and Burbank.
“This is a huge milestone for the project and it represents the culmination of years of analysis and stakeholder engagement to connect high-speed rail between two of the state’s major metropolitan centres, San Francisco and Los Angeles,” said authority CEO Brian Kelly. “With board approval, the project will have environmental clearance for 463 miles (745km) of the Phase 1 system between downtown San Francisco and downtown Los Angeles.”
The Final EIR/EIS includes analysis of all six build alternatives and the No Project Alternative. The preferred alternative – SR14A Alternative – runs along State Route 14 and is approximately 61km. It will be a grade-separated, high-speed rail-only system with tunnels through Acton and much of the Angeles National Forest and the San Gabriel Mountains National Monument.
Pending board approval, the authority can begin preparing the segment for construction as funding becomes available.
The authority expects to receive environmental approval for the Los Angeles to Anaheim segment next year, which will clear the way for the full 795km Phase 1.
Work has begun to extend the 191km currently under construction to 275km of future electrified high-speed rail from Merced to Bakersfield. There are more than 25 active construction sites in the Valley, with environmental approval cleared for 680km of the high-speed rail programme from the Bay Area to Los Angeles County.
